


changing times

by deuteroscopies



Series: the prophet and the king [36]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, M/M, Texting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-05
Updated: 2020-07-05
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:20:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24747475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deuteroscopies/pseuds/deuteroscopies
Summary: A trip to Ephram's hometown of Apple Fall, Kentucky is on the horizon, and certain things need to be brought up and talked out. Most of them silly, and sexy -- a little bit soft and sad, but all of it loving.(Honestly this one is straight-up fluffiness lol)
Relationships: Freddie Watts/Ephram Pettaline
Series: the prophet and the king [36]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1551673





	changing times

**Author's Note:**

> >   
> Freddie Watts = Tom Hardy FC, Ephram Pettaline = Boyd Holbrook FC. These stories are set in the supernatural town of Soapberry Springs, in the Pacific Northwest. Freddie is a fairy con man from London, with cobalt-coloured dragonfly wings and silver fairy dust, who has a Japanese Chin familiar named Oliver; Ephram is a witch from impoverished East Kentucky who shares his body with a demon called Anaxis and has green magic of his own.
>> 
>> [the prophet and the king 'verse tumblr](http://theprophetandtheking.tumblr.com/)  
> 

> [TXT] Just so you know, my darling, working a double shift does not mean two dozen doughnuts, yeah? ;)

TXT: Listen you

TXT: Ain’t it enough I promised to stop eating at that food truck what only serves blue food items? You gotta stop me from browsing through a mere fifth of what Perl orders in every day? SOMEONE’S gotta eat em

TXT: Besides you could be sweet talking me about much better things than doughnuts. You losing your touch at being naughty, _dear_?

> [TXT] Oi, don’t you ‘dear’ me, Ephram Pettaline - or I swear I won’t send ANY of the photos I’ve just taken. xP
> 
> [TXT] And some of them show off my naughty touch rather nicely. ;)

TXT: WAIT WHAT YOU NEVER SAID NOTHING BOUT NO PHOTOS

TXT: Just let me wipe the doughnut glaze off my fingers

TXT: or you know what hell send em on thru, I’ll just lick off the sticky-sweet while I’m looking at you, sugarplum <3333

> [TXT] That’s better. ;P
> 
> [TXT] First though, a little warning. I got my hair cut today.
> 
> [[IMG](https://66.media.tumblr.com/e85009eaef50fe59ddf5f626c6524d3a/tumblr_pt0kv72mNS1vr0ahbo1_500.jpg)] 
> 
> [TXT] Pix took the photo - which admittedly, is a bit rubbish - but it’s the one that best shows what I’ve had done.
> 
> [TXT] The rest of my photos tend to feature other parts of my body a bit more heavily. ;)
> 
> [TXT] So what do you think?

TXT: oh Jesus Freddie that’s

TXT: I’m gonna mix up some sugar glaze once I get home and fix your hair with it and then lick you down like a goddamn momma cat just see if I don’t

TXT: It’s _gorgeous_ , honey. You look 

TXT: Y’know what send me a picture that shows the rest of you before I blow my compliment load right off the bat

> [TXT]: Oh, thank god. haha I was worried there for a minute. 
> 
> [TXT] Alright, first off, you know I’m never going to object to your blowing a load all over me. <3 ;D
> 
> [TXT] And secondly, I rather like that sugar glaze idea - provided you glaze more than just my hair. So maybe I’ll just hold on to the dirty pictures for now, and let you take some of your own once you get home, hm?
> 
> [[IMG](https://66.media.tumblr.com/8f4d3eca789105f1483c46fa18adf972/tumblr_pt0m0naJ2q1vr0ahbo1_540.jpg)] 
> 
> [TXT] We had to go to that bloody local commerce what-have-you up at the university today, remember? So that was taken after the Mayor’d been droning on for the better part of an hour. Pixi says she’s never seen me look so rumpled, so she thought it merited preservation. lol

TXT: Theeeere’s my naughty lil fairy boy <3

TXT: I’ll have you honey dipped so fast it’ll give Krispy Kreme a run for their money.

TXT: It’s a rumpled that makes me jealous I wasn’t the one what did the rumpling, man o’mine. 

TXT: You look damn scrumptious, Mr. Watts-Pettaline. I mean it. All sorts’ve rough-edged and rich at the same time. Is there a term for that? 

TXT: Other than mouthwatering that is

> [TXT] Have I mentioned recently how much I adore it that you encourage all my bad habits, love? <3
> 
> [TXT] I may already be a bit sticky just thinking about it…
> 
> [TXT] You’ll have to make up for it later. Rumple me properly.
> 
> [TXT] Mmm. I do like that. <333 :) And rakish is the best word I can come up with at the moment, darling - but, in my defence, my train of thought is headed in a very particular direction right now. haha

TXT: Do I count as one of your bad habits?

TXT: You know what I really like? Is when we been having pancakes or baklava or something what’s sweet and syrupy and then our fingertips sort of stick to each other’s skin when we touch, just for that one lil moment. 

TXT: Like leaving fingerprints melting in sugar on each other. Candied evidence I was there on you, you was there on me.

TXT: Rumple you up till we end up spinning gold.

TXT: Rakish! That’s it, that’s the right word. mmmmm. 

TXT: I would call you ‘my husband, the rake’ but really it should be ‘my husband, the hoe’ shouldn’t it 

> [TXT] Not even a little. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, darling. My smartest decision and greatest achievement all rolled into one. <333
> 
> [TXT] Did you know, Ephram, how utterly beautiful some of the things you say to me are? I mean it, love. Sometimes it’s just the best sort of devastating the way that you breathe art into a room. 
> 
> [TXT] Are you going to be terribly late tonight?   
>    
>  [TXT] xD Never ever let on to Iann that I’ve approved of a pun - but yes, sweetheart, ‘your husband, the hoe’ is the title I was born for. haha

TXT: oh Freddie. Oh, _honey._

TXT: I’m gonna crush my instinct to say you’re exaggerating because you’re in love with me, and take that compliment. <3 You deserve to have beautiful artistic things heaped on you.

TXT: LIKE YOURS TRULY

TXT: I won’t be late. Even if I have to deputize one of the jeeps to fill in for me, I won’t be late.

TXT: awwwww. I’ll be ‘your husband, the post pounder’ if you like

> [TXT] I love you very much, boy of mine. 
> 
> [TXT] Good - because madly in love with you or not, it’s true. <3 And thank-you, love; you deserve to have all your gifts and talents appreciated. 
> 
> [TXT] xD YES!
> 
> [TXT] I’ll hold you to that. I’m already clockwatching.  
>    
>  [TXT] I’ll hold you to that, too. ;) haha

TXT: Good thing we live together then. Makes loving each other real convenient-like.

TXT: I ain’t yet displayed all my talents! I can skip rope real fast and since I come from a town of coal miners who like to talk shit and make dumbass bar bets, I can spell pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis

TXT: Two more casefiles to sign off on and I’m on my way to you, babe. Can you put up some tea? I want gingersnaps and as much as I hate to admit it they’re nicest with hot tea

TXT: It’s within your rights to hold me to whatever the heck you want ;p

> [TXT]: It does, doesn’t it? We should keep on then. I’d hate to have to commute. 
> 
> [TXT] I can barely /read/ that bloody word - never mind spell it. haha But now you’re going to have to put your money where your mouth is sweetheart; I’ll demand a demonstration when you get home. 
> 
> [TXT] What’s it mean, btw? Something to do with tiny silicone volcanoes? xD
> 
> [TXT] /Proper/ tea, you mean? ;P And yes, love, I’ll put the kettle on. I’ll even rescue the gingersnaps from Ollie so there’ll still be some when you get here. 
> 
> [TXT] The trick is deciding what to hold you to first. ;)

TXT: It’s a deal. Just be forewarned this means I might use your towel sometimes

TXT: What how dare you question my abilities! I’ll spell rings around you.

TXT: It’s some kind of joke word that some intellectual numptie made up to sound like a silica-based disease of the lungs. Like a play on pneumoconiosis – that’s a real thing – that’s black lung like my people get from the coal mines

TXT: It’s sorter a gallows humour thing for us heh

TXT: I will never call it proper tea, but I’ll drink it without making snarky comments XD

TXT: Hold me to your heart; don’t ever let me go. <3

> [TXT] I think I can accept that. So long as you don’t mind if I occasionally help myself to a t-shirt of yours along the way.
> 
> [TXT] Are you sure? I’m told I can be very distracting when I try - and you know I don’t like to lose at things. ;)
> 
> [TXT] lol I think black lung is something you have to have personal experience with in order to see the funny side, sweetheart. 
> 
> [TXT] Oh, you will, will you? How very big of you. xP
> 
> [TXT] You’re always there, love. And you always will be. <3

TXT: Since you buy and/or vet most of my tshirts these days I think that’s fair. Do me a favour tho and once or twice wear tshirts that are too small for you? I’m shallow and I like to ogle your muscles

TXT: SHIT and I just basically told you exactly how to distract me god dammit!!

TXT: yeah, I guess you kinda had to be there ;p

TXT: I am very, very big it’s true

TXT: Baby, if I wanted to go camping for a night, would you come with me?

> [TXT] Consider it done, sweetheart. I’ll be wearing something painted on by the time you get home. ;D
> 
> [TXT] If it makes you feel better, love, you’ve not told me anything I didn’t already know, and didn’t already intend to exploit. haha
> 
> [TXT] One day I’ll get my tour round Apple Fall - it can be our belated honeymoon. lol 
> 
> [TXT] I always knew I was a size queen at heart. <3 haha
> 
> [TXT] You know I’d go with you anywhere. Even camping. 
> 
> [TXT] …so long as you PROMISE that it’s only for one night. lol And that we don’t have to sleep directly on the ground. 

TXT: Plz keep in mind that I know what it looks like when you LITERALLY have something painted on

TXT: How did I ever fall in love with such a wicked man? And me the upstanding and respectable sheriff of this here town

TXT: Sooner than you think, darlin. Neither of us does too good with delayed gratification. Plus Alesha keeps hounding me to bring you by and show you off.

TXT: Well worth being a size queen when you know what to do with the object of your greedy desire heh

TXT: Only one night I promise! And not too far afield. I make no other promises though. If you agree to go camping with me you agree to go _camping_. No leniency will be given, Freddie.

> [TXT] True. But this is still going to make you happy, darling - even if have stayed dressed. ;) haha
> 
> [TXT] The Sheriff always falls madly in love with the whore in Westerns, love. ;*
> 
> [TXT] Does that mean we’ve another holiday on the horizon? :D <3
> 
> [TXT] I like to think I’m a singular talent in that department, being that I’m so devoted to my muse.
> 
> [TXT] What does your sort of camping entail, husband? How worried do I need to be? lol 

TXT: Good thing I adore you just as much dressed as undressed. Same way as I feel about chickens although I prefer you alive and unfried

TXT: I didnt realize you watched enough Westerns to know the formula they follow, man o’ mine!!

TXT: Yes it does. I’m right now in the process of letting the kinfolk know, so they’ll be on their best behaviour. Which ain’t that great but at least I can say I tried.

TXT: I never get tired of you calling me your muse, you know that? I mean it would likely seem ridiculous to anybody else that I could be someone’s _muse_ but whatever. I love it.

TXT: We’ll be dining on fire-roasted squirrel, for starters

> [TXT] Since you’ve said you adore me, I’m going to take your having compared me to a fried chicken as the compliment I know it was intended to be. xD
> 
> [TXT] I like a good Western on occasion! I have as-yet unplumbed depths, my darling. 
> 
> [TXT] REALLY? :D <333 Have you told your mum yet? What’s Lulie said? 
> 
> [TXT] And why do they need to be on their best behaviour? I’ve talked to a few of them already, after all…
> 
> [TXT] Well, that works out then, because I love being able to say it. <3 Whether I can count myself as one or not, sweetheart, you make me /feel/ like an artist. You inspire me towards creation like nothing else ever has. 
> 
> [TXT] Are you having me on?

TXT: Very compliment. Just ask Miu Miu, she’ll tell you how glorious it is to be a chicken

TXT: If you have yet-unplumbed depths sweetiepie then I ain’t been diligent enough in the bedroom

TXT: Really :D I told Momma first! She wanted us to stay with her while we’re there but I said no goddamn way and she din’t press after that hah hah. She’s over the moon at the idea of me bringing you, though. Wanted to know if she should spiff the place up so’s you don’t feel uncomfortable in my hometown squalor.

TXT: I mean she didnt LITERALLY say squalor but I could tell she’s a mite worried. Like you said it ain’t like you two havent talked, she knows you wouldn’t be an asshole bout it, but she wants to cast a good light on the family, after all.

TXT: It’s the extended family who’re gonna be the wild cards in this situation

TXT: If I get to be your muse then that makes you an artist. That’s how it works, right? Besides, your creations are incredible, Freddie. Everbody who comes in the station loves them bird paintings you did for me, and those was just on a whim for you!

TXT: You’ll need a good dental floss. One that don’t snap easy.

> [TXT] So long as the word ‘fryer’ is never employed. xD My Miu Miu is a delicate flower.   
>    
>  [TXT] We’ll have to agree to disagree there, love - but you’re welcome to put in a bit of concentrated effort tonight, just to be sure. ;)
> 
> [TXT] :D What did I do to deserve such a lovely surprise? <3 
> 
> [TXT] Wait- are you protecting your mum from the sort of noise she may hear coming out of our room at night? xD And please tell her not to go to any trouble just for me, sweetheart. <33 I mean, I’ve wanted to see Apple Fall for /ages/, yeah? I’m just happy to be going, and getting to meet your family in person.
> 
> [TXT] I’ve talked to some of them too though! At least a few cousins have written me so far.
> 
> [TXT] I suppose it does, yeah. :) And thank-you, love; that makes me ridiculously happy. <3 Especially as I’ve got a few other things I’ve been wanting to start working on.
> 
> [TXT] Ephram, if you’re being funny…

TXT: You take such good care of your lil poultry paramour! No wonder Miu Miu fluffs so much when she hears your voice.

TXT: I’ll do just that. Also the other day during a long lunch I stopped in at that shop Barbarella, you know it? It’s run by these best friends who’re a nymph and an atronach and it’s all specialty and custom dildos and vibrators and stuff, anyhow long story longer they make sex toys that are replicas of your own junk

TXT: What I’m saying is I got you a present for Pride, baby

TXT: To deserve a trip to Apple Fall? You married me and made my life a thousand times better and helped me be a better man and taught me how to dress properly and groom myself and helped me boost a pair of Radiance Peacocks. And that’s only the greatest hits <3

TXT: Uh yeah I don’t wanna face my Momma over bacon and grits when she’s been kept up listening to me rail you senseless all night thank you. Dont worry you’ll be real happy with where we’re gonna be staying.

TXT: The cousins who sent you my shitty childhood writing?!? I’m not inviting them. They need to be punished.

TXT: Momma’s gonna scrub the place down no matter what I say. And mark my words there’ll be new curtains and they’ll be lace because she thinks that’s the height of fancy, so admire the curtains no matter what else you do

TXT: That’s the beauty of me being funny, nobody can ever tell for sure

> [TXT] I’ve never had a pet before - and Miu Miu’s got so much personality squashed into that round little body that she’s a bit pet+, really. :D I mean, she almost puts me in mind of a witch’s familiar that way.
> 
> [TXT] I do know of Barbarella - I just haven’t managed to get in to have a look around yet! But I want to. Quite a lot, actually. I-
> 
> [TXT] :D !!! You did? God, you’re gorgeous. You spoil me, sweetheart. <3 Honestly, I’m excited just thinking about it. I mean, now I’ll be able to take you from both ends at once, love… are you picturing it? ;) Or would you rather DP me first?
> 
> [TXT] In case I’m being too subtle, darling - FINISH THOSE BLOODY REPORTS AND GET HOME. lol :*
> 
> [TXT] I’m glad I’ve got as many hits as all that. <33 
> 
> [TXT] haha Fair point. Not having a mum, I sometimes forget how awkward that sort of thing must be. xD Where will we be staying then?
> 
> [TXT] Oi! I enjoyed those poems. I like imagining what you must have been like at that age. Out of curiosity though, darling, how many cousins and bits of extended family have you got in Apple Fall?
> 
> [TXT] I’m quite sure I’ll have more to admire once we get there than the curtains - but I’ll make sure to give them an honourable mention, all the same. I’d actually like to bring your mother a gift, as well. What sort of thing do you think she’d want, love?
> 
> [TXT] :P 
> 
> [TXT] Assuming you’re serious about this squirrel business… what else does proper camping entail?

TXT: Pet+, I love that. She’d be a familiar if she gave the slightest fuck about me, but she’s all eyes and tailfeathers for you, my love. Who can blame her?

TXT: I’d finish these reports ALOT sooner if you weren’t pitting those images in my head goddammit cant even tye

- _twelve minutes later_ -

TXT: Okay better now. Finishing off the last report and heading home.

“Freddie? Honey?” Ephram bawled as soon as he got through the door – needlessly, because he knew his husband would be either in the kitchen or in the living room, most likely. “In front of the telly, love,” Freddie called just as Ephram stepped into the living room carrying a gorgeously wrapped and beribboned box from Barbarella on the coffee table and stooping to give Freddie a kiss before he flopped down next to his husband, gathering Freddie in as the fairy instinctively cuddled closer. The two of them moving to fit themselves into a cuddle as Ephram settled in, their physical affection as intuitive and reflexive as ever.

“Your being naughty over text only means you prolonged waiting for me to sort you out, y’know,” Ephram scolded Freddie with a smile. “And here I’d resolved not to jerk off in my office no more.” He nodded at the box. “Gimme a minute or two to settle in and then you can open that and see what it looks like.”

Freddie gave a theatrical sigh, pouting exaggeratedly, his eyes sparkling, when his husband teasingly chided him for being so badly behaved. But he wasn’t able to maintain it. His eyes darting over to the box on the coffee table, the fairy grinned and swung a leg over Ephram’s lap to straddle him - giving a little wiggle to make sure he was seated, heavily and properly, in _just_ the right place. 

True to his promise, he was wearing a very tight t-shirt - one that Perl had given him 2 Christmases ago, or thereabouts; blue and chicken-themed and at least a size too small - paired with Burberry trackies, which were quite obviously being worn without any pants underneath, his new haircut mussed; and he rocked a bit, wickedly, fingers already making quick work of Ephram’s buttons. 

At which point Oliver decided to take his leave, heading to another room to nap until they’d gotten it out of their systems. If such a thing was possible.

“Did you really have a wank in your office?” Freddie asked, a playful smile on his lips. “Because if you did, you really should tell me about it -” he ground down a bit harder, in emphasis. 

“Mmmmmm, yeah, I did –” Ephram skimmed his fingers up Freddie’s sides, enjoying the way that the jersey material snagged due to its form-fittingness before giving way to warm, smooth skin; taking in the cosy rumpledness of Freddie-at-home, which meant his usually impeccable husband allowed himself things like designer trackpants. And matched with the t-shirt and the rakish haircut, Ephram found the effect very appealing indeed. " God, you feel good."

“’Course I do,” Freddie teased, rolling his hips, his voice a warm affectionate burr, “You’re desperately in love with me, and we haven’t had a proper fuck since yesterday evening - I feel like _Heaven_.” He grinned and kissed his husband’s lips, “Or at least, that’s what _you_ feel like to _me_ …”

“Everything about you is heaven,” Ephram declared soppily, enjoying the wallow in sentimentality. “My own adorable capricious artistic sugarpie winged lil piece of heaven.”

“- and you can have it. But only _after_ you’ve spelled that word. Neuro-wotsit.” The fairy pulled his darling’s shirt open and began to toy with a nipple; his smile turning even more mischievous. “And if you bugger it up, I get to play with my new toy until you’re ready to see to me properly…”

“Neuro-wotsit? Surely you mean – ahem – pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.” Ephram spelled the word out with great aplomb, finishing off with saying it as a full stop. “Brilliant of me, right? And it means you’re just gonna have to wait even _longer_ before getting your mouth or your pretty arse on your new toy. Both of which I was thinking about while I jerked off, by the way. You sure got a way with painting pictures in whatever medium, man o’mine.”

When Ephram spelled his enormous fuck-off word properly though - or what _sounded_ like properly, any road; Freddie had no idea at all how to spell it himself - the fairy’s face fell into a small pout at having been bested. A pout which dissolved again the moment Ephram began to sing the praises of Freddie’s anatomy, even despite the delay in gratification. 

“Only with you as my muse, sweetheart,” Freddie said truthfully, leaning in to brush their noses together and lingering for a moment, “You’re what elevates anything I do to the level of _art_.” Ephram curved his arms around Freddie’s distracting hips, rocking up against him as they both leaned in for a kiss. “Momma walked in on me one time,” he murmured, “just one, and it weren’t even with Marigold, it was with a different girl, a townie, this girl name’a Susie who had strawberry blonde hair that she wore long and straight with a thick headband like she was from the seventies. She was so beautiful, Freddie, and she had this low voice and she said my name like every five words while we was fuckin’.” He gave a little pleased noise at the memory, then another as Freddie’s fingers gave a clever flick. 

“I didn’t realize Momma had come home but after, once Susie left, she sat me down outside and let me have a beer and we watched lightning bugs and she told me real serious that she understood if I was gonna be with girls … honestly, I reckon she was relieved about it being a girl … but I had to be respectful in her house.” Ephram fixed Freddie with a look. “Which is a mom way of saying her house is a no-fuckin’ zone where I’m concerned.” 

Laughing lightly, Freddie leaned in again, and they carried on, rocking together infinitesimally and kissing lazily; the fairy smiling, fond and indulgent as his husband told him about Lulie’s reaction when she’d caught him in flagrante delicto with his townie girl, waxing for a moment on what had made her special. Obviously, rose-gold had _always_ appealed to Ephram, and Freddie thought that news was utterly adorable - and more than enough to make up for the little scolding that had carried it to him.

And as such, he conceded defeat with an effort at contrition that was really just another smiling chuckle, holding up his hand in a pledge. “No sex at your mum’s,” the fairy repeated, his gravitas more than a little lacking as he rolled his hips again, “No fucking, no cocksucking, no dirty talk…no face-sitting, no fingering…” He paused, playfully contemplative. “Does it still count as fucking if my new toy acts as your proxy, and I’m _very_ quiet?” Then, pulling back again, a cheeky glimmer in his eyes, he pinched one of Ephram’s nipples sharply. “But the next time I get you hard at work, you’d bloody well better _come home_ , yeah? So that _I_ can enjoy it too.”

Ephram gave a little rolling _mrrr_ when Freddie pinched him, laughing, “Okay, okay, I promise. No more solo ridin’, I’ll take a long lunch break or early day and come find you to take the edge off in a much funner way.” 

A prospective pastime that expanded into a whole potential repertoire as Freddie rocked down into Ephram’s lap and shaped his suggestive, plum-mouthed accent around a whole list of activities that would be a no-go in Lulie’s back bedroom. By the time Freddie got around to wondering if dicking himself with Barbarella’s husband-shaped offering was allowable, Ephram was squirming under his fairy’s delicious, insistent weight; he grabbed Freddie’s pledging hand and pressed those naughty fingers to his mouth, mumbling, “…what higher authority d’you even pledge on, Mischief?” He grinned, giving Freddie’s adam’s apple a lick and kiss. “I ain’t tellin’ you where we’re staying, though. That’s a surprise.”

Freddie grinned when Ephram caught his fingers and kissed at them, the teasing indulgence of the pet name warming him from the inside out. “My own, of course,” he replied, eyes sparkling. “Or yours. Depending on which of us is Daddy that day.”

But by then Ephram was talking of surprises, and Freddie’s train of thought - a tired fairy was as fairy as they came - had jumped its tracks again. That little bit of attention to his throat didn’t exactly go amiss, either.

“I still can’t believe we’re going,” he said happily, “You’ll need to tell me what to pack, love - and what to bring for your mum, like I said before.”

Pushing his fingers against the small of Freddie’s back, Ephram kept on smiling at his husband, basking in how marvellously they fit together. “I can’t tell you how much family I got, neither,” he admitted cheerily. “A bunch of em might not even be blood-or-paper related to me, just so close to being family that we call em that.” His stroking grew slower, more contemplative. “They’s all yours too, now, y’know, Freddie. More family than you could ever know what to do with. And most of em are gonna love you on sight, I just know it.”

Freddie sat up straighter when Ephram told him that all of _his_ family was now Freddie’s family too; something close to an uncharacteristic shyness creeping into his expression, though his smile remained. “Do you think so?” he asked, his voice a bit softer than before, “I mean… a lot of people round here find me a bit hard work. Never mind the fact that I’m not even remotely religious… or a woman.” Freddie smiled a bit ruefully. “I honestly haven’t the first bloody idea what families are supposed to be like, sweetheart. But thank-you… for being willing to share yours with me all the same.”

The truth was that Ephram loved it, the teasing, especially in relation to his family. He wouldn’t have been able to bear it if Freddie treated the Apple Fall kinfolk like they were the subjects of some Flannery O’Connor story or something: oddities who should be handled with kid gloves and waxen manners, or else caricatures made up out of whole cloth who’d inevitably disappoint. He realized, with Freddie wrapped around him and conjuring up ways to be badly behaved around Ephram’s momma, that this was what he needed in order to bring a fairy husband home to his backwoods family. He needed a Freddie who could be counted on to never apologize for or hide the fact that he was queer, who would hold his own if he needed to, and who would do it all with charm and grace and understanding that these people were who Ephram came from.

“I ain’t a religious woman neither,” Ephram said solemnly, then grinned and toppled Freddie onto his back on the sofa, settling down on top of him and helping himself to kisses. “Freddie. I ain’t gonna let there be one single solitary doubt in anybody’s mind who you are to me. So if they wanna carry on countin’ me as kin, they’s gonna count you as kin, too. Some of em might not be crazy about it, but that’s family.” Ephram’s gaze softened as he stroked the curve of Freddie’s cheek and tapped his full bottom lip. “Some of em are gonna love you like they couldn’t imagine me without you. And that’s family too.”

The three of them, Freddie and Ollie and Ephram, they were a family – but that wasn’t quite the same. Not for his Freddie, who’d been abandoned and discarded by his own family, who’d never had a chance at the simultaneous devotion and frustration that kinfolk could bring. He knew what it meant for his fairy, that somebody would _want_ to fold him into that mythical thing, a group of people you were connected to by blood and happenstance and culture all mixed up together.

The flutter of shyness in Freddie’s manner, so very unlike the self-possessed and well-nigh shameless man that his darling normally was, all but made Ephram heartsick for what his husband had been denied. “By the time we leave the Fall,” Ephram promised, shifting his hips in a rekindling flare of desire, “you won’t ever need to wonder what being part of a family’s like. And they won’t have no doubt that you’re the most precious thing in the world to me, and you belong right here at my side.”

When Ephram declared that he wasn’t a religious woman _either_ , manhandling Freddie playfully down onto his back and settling on top of him, his weight deliciously heavy between the splay of the fairy’s legs and his greedy kisses more than welcome, Freddie laughed and hooked his arms around his husband’s neck, holding him close and thinking that his access to his present might not be nearly so far off as he’d been led to believe. As Ephram carried on talking though, explaining to Freddie the way that things were going to be in Apple Fall - Freddie’s position amongst the Pettalines and Lulie’s people; the nature of family, and the sort of love unique to that connection - touching the fairy’s face softly, Freddie felt such a beautiful sense of certainty and belonging wash over him that, for a moment, he simply didn’t have any words. He just tugged Ephram closer to nose against his cheek, breathing him in and reveling in him.

In _them_ , and what had together.

But the way that Ephram’s hips rocked as he promised that there wouldn’t be a single one of his relations in doubt about their rightness for each other and the depth of his love by the time they left Kentucky, dragged a soft groan of want from the back of Freddie’s throat.

“Good,” he said, kissing at the corner of his witch’s mouth, before licking his way back inside, “-because there isn’t anywhere else I ever intend to be.”

From the moment Freddie'd voiced his reasoning of their trade-off of authority depending on their moods Ephram had felt a pulse of heat swirling low in his belly. It stayed there, kindling as his husband held him tight and listened, intoxicatingly docile and puckish at once, while Ephram outlined their incipient extended family structure. He could see the soft gear-shift of understanding in Freddie’s eyes, the blue of them brightening the grey, just before Freddie tugged him in for a nuzzle. Pledging that he’d always want to be right next to Ephram, before claiming a taste as well.

And that was enough for Ephram to sprawl his long legs awkwardly off the sofa, crouching to a stand and pulling his fairy up with him. “Bring your present, dumplin’,” Ephram commanded throatily, hand latched around Freddie’s wrist. “We gonna go upstairs and see what it looks like with you on.” He smiled, then laughed, leaning in to slant their mouths together for another warm-and-getting-hotter kiss. 

“And maybe test out how quiet you can be, so’s we’ll know whether to pack it for our trip.”


End file.
